And it bowed its long trunk before the child, as people bow before princes. In a great bow it bent itself towards the ground, and finally it came down so far that the big crown with the trembling leaves swept the desert sand. The child appeared to be neither frightened nor surprised; with a joyous cry he loosened cluster after cluster from the old palm’s crown. When he had plucked enough dates, and the tree still lay on the ground, the child came back again and caressed it and said, in the gentlest voice: “Palm, raise thee! Palm, raise thee!” Slowly and reverently the big tree raised itself on its slender trunk, while the leaves played like harps. “Now I know for whom they are playing the death melody,” said the palm to itself when it stood erect once more. “It is not for any of these people.” The man and the woman sank upon their knees and thanked God. “Thou hast seen our agony and removed it. Thou art the Powerful One who bendest the palm-trunk like a reed. What enemy should we fear when Thy strength protects us?” The next time a caravan passed through the desert, the travelers saw that the great palm’s leaf-crown had withered. “How can this be?” said a traveler. “This palm was not to die before it had seen a King greater than Solomon.” “Mayhap it hath seen him,” answered another of the desert travelers. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration: In Nazareth] IN NAZARETH Once, when Jesus was only five years old, he sat on the doorstep outside his father’s workshop, in Nazareth, and made clay cuckoos from a lump of clay which the potter across the way had given him. He was happier than usual. All the children in the quarter had told Jesus that the potter was a disobliging man, who wouldn’t let himself be coaxed, either by soft glances or honeyed words, and he had never dared ask aught of him. But, you see, he hardly knew how it had come about. He had only stood on his doorstep and, with yearning eyes, looked upon the neighbor working at his molds, and then that neighbor had come over from his stall and given him so much clay that it would have been enough to finish a whole wine jug. On the stoop of the next house sat Judas, his face covered with bruises and his clothes full of rents, which he had acquired during his continual fights with street urchins. For the moment he was quiet, he neither quarreled nor fought, but worked with a bit of clay, just as Jesus did. But this clay he had not been able to procure for himself. He hardly dared venture within sight of the potter, who complained that he was in the habit of throwing stones at his fragile wares, and would have driven him away with a good beating. It was Jesus who had divided his portion with him.